


If You Want Me To Stay

by orphan_account



Series: This Is The Place [1]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Art School, Alternate Universe - Ballet, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Hale Fire, Art School, Artist Derek, Ballet, Dancer Stiles, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-15
Updated: 2013-11-15
Packaged: 2018-01-01 15:37:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1045617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Derek is a fine arts student and Stiles is a dancer, practicing in the same Beacon Hills Police Department shirt his mom used to wear when he watched her practice in the living room.</p>
            </blockquote>





	If You Want Me To Stay

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AmberEyedLover](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmberEyedLover/gifts).



> This is inspired by moonlittshadows' [post](http://moonlittshadows.tumblr.com/post/66872015316/i-want-a-fic-where-derek-is-at-a-arts-school-for) on Tumblr:  
>  _Derek heads past the dance studios one night as a short cut back to his dorm when he see’s a light on and he knows that they should be off so he goes to turn them off and looks through the window to see Stiles stood in the middle of the room in a pair of baggy sweat pants and a old BHPD shirt of his dad’s which he stole when he was younger because it used to belong to his mom and she used to steal it too and Stiles always wanted to be like her when he was younger (she was a dancer) and even at nineteen, Stiles still cant shake the habit._
> 
>  
> 
> _Derek watches Stiles start dancing and finds himself locked on the boy before Stiles is turning and Derek quickly ducks and runs like a coward because he refuses to admit that he’s starting to like the kid already despite only seeing him twice._
> 
>  
> 
> This will be written as a series because I've wanted a ballet!AU for ages and gave up on waiting.

It’s the first day of the new school year when Derek first runs into him. He’d been pointedly ignoring the freshmen who were generally scrambling across campus, their hands desperately clutching maps that were turned around the wrong way. 

He smirked at the ones who looked too young to be anything but new students despite how confident they stood with their phones in hand, because he knew what they were doing. He knew that the college had just upgraded their app, and why the school needed one at all was unknown, and he knew that the map was probably the only function on it that would be in use today. 

He rolls his eyes at the kids who stumble their way down the paths, bumping into each other, unable to tear their eyes away from their maps, whether they’re physical copies or on their phone screens, because they’re never going to learn where anything is if they rely too heavily on it. 

That’s just asking to be late to class, having to say it’s because you couldn’t find the room, two years after attending the school. 

He gets himself coffee at his favourite café on campus, opening the course syllabus for each of his classes on his iPad and scrolling through what they expected of him this semester. Before he’d started his degree of fine arts, back when he had to explain why people actually wanted to go to an Arts School and how “No, Peter, it’s not useless to study art”, his family had mocked him because they believed he’d only wanted to do it because he was lazy. 

Three years had passed and anybody who said studying Fine Arts was easy was well-deserving of a punch in the face, Derek thought. This semester looked like he was going to need to finally get around to renting out some space to work, otherwise he was going to drown underneath a mass of canvas and cartridge paper. Well, that is if he doesn’t purposely drown himself in the water he uses to wash his paintbrushes first.

He’s just leaving the café, juggling his iPad and cup, when he sees someone struggling with their own belongings across the quad. The kid looks like he’s one of the new students heading toward the dormitories, attempting to keep his hold on the box balanced against his hip as his duffle bag begins slipping from its place at the top of his shoulder. The kid’s other hand is holding onto a copy of the campus map, probably one of the ones being handed out all over the place by various members of the student council, and he’s not even trying to look like he isn’t lost. 

If he walked directly in a straight line, Derek knows that the kid will hit his destination in mind – that is, if he actually is in search of the dorms – but he doesn’t seem to realise this as he spins in a circle, his bag slipping to the ground just seconds before he drops the box as well.

Possessions tumble out across the lawn, and even from where Derek’s standing he knows that the kid is flustered, looking up at the sky like he’s just willing it to start raining and make his day even worse.

For a few seconds, Derek deliberates going over there and asking if he needs any help, but then he’s reminded of his readings that have to be done before classes officially start, and how long it usually takes him to get through them. 

Seriously, art theory is the worst. 

The kid looks cute, from what Derek can see, but he doesn’t look gracious enough to be a dancer, nor does he look like he has the attention span required for art. Even though they haven’t talked, and Derek’s only been watching him for a couple of minutes, it’s obvious that the kid can’t stand still. He shuffles his weight from leg to leg, flailing his hands while he packs his belongings back into the box like he’s having a very animated conversation with himself.

So, that crosses dancing and fine arts off of the list, which only really leaves acting. There is something confident about the way the kid’s holding himself, even though all the other freshmen look like they’re only just keeping it together, so Derek wouldn’t be surprised. 

He rolls his eyes, even though he doesn’t know for sure, because actors? He really doesn’t have the time for them.

**

Three weeks pass and Derek finds himself a room to paint in. He shares it with two others, a girl named Erica who so far has only been painting naked portraits even though he’s sure he heard her say she’s only enrolled in theory classes this semester, and a guy named Isaac whose pieces are dark and haunting and, from what Derek’s seen, a perfect reflection of who Isaac is. 

Though, Derek doesn’t really have room to talk on how dark another person’s work is.

He’s spent the last two weeks working on a painting; a skull, lacking some significant details, sitting in the foreground with purple shadows beneath the eye sockets and around the poorly-shaped edges like it belongs to a person who had their head bashed in. It’s dark, he knows that, especially after Isaac, of all people, had looked at it and said, “Woah, dude, that looks like something out of my nightmares,” but he didn’t intend it to be. The reds and oranges, painted over the black outline of the skull, was supposed to be bright, inspiring hope, rather than the morbid decay and rust it appears to be. 

He takes one last look at it, sighing, and begins on painting over it with white paint. He’s too poor to just buy new canvas after new canvas, and even if he did like it, what’s he going to do? Put it up on the wall of his bedroom, ignoring the looks given to him by one-night stands when they see what is, essentially, a painting of a bashed-in skull? No, thank you. 

He’s just finishing up the coat of paint when Isaac comes back in, looking half-asleep with two cups of coffee in his hands. 

“Oh, you’re still here,” he says, frowning, and then looking down to the drinks he’s holding.

Derek stares questioningly, because if Isaac hadn’t expected him to be here, why would he have brought enough coffee for the both of them?

“Were you expecting someone else?” he asks.

Isaac shakes his head then, holding out a drink for Derek, “I have trouble sleeping sometimes, so I thought I’d try to get some work in. I have class at eight, so I figured I’d need the caffeine to get me through it.”

Derek nods, understanding, a mouth full of coffee as he tries to angle his head to ask a question that does not need to be asked right this very second but suddenly he’s tired and can’t wait, “What time is it anyway?”

“Man, it’s like four.”

Derek pulls his phone out of his pocket even though the battery died just before Erica and Isaac left earlier in the evening. He tries to turn it on, but, of course, it’s no use. 

“I should probably go,” he says, even though he’s taking another sip of coffee and looking at his canvas like he’d still like to get some work done.

Isaac makes a noise of acknowledgement, already standing over in his own workspace that’s even more cluttered than Derek’s with paper spilling over towards Erica’s desk. Derek looks at him then, noting the way his curly hair looks like it hasn’t been washed in a few days and how obvious that tonight isn’t the first night he’s come to the room because he couldn’t sleep. Even though he doesn’t know what Isaac’s going through, he wants to help. 

“Are you okay?” He asks, unsure whether or not this is crossing a line. 

Isaac shrugs, which is more than what Derek was expecting. 

“As okay as I always am.”

It’s probably just the time, the way it’s easier to be honest with people when you’re tired and can brush it off easily the next morning as an emotion caused by having not slept enough, but there’s truthfulness there too. Especially when Isaac’s painting a mannequin being buried beneath blood-red vines that are pulling the plastic limbs apart. 

“I owe you for the coffee,” he says, then, watching as Isaac keeps painting without tearing his eyes away from the painting, “let me know when you’re free.”

Isaac nods, still not looking at him, “Thanks, Derek.”

Derek leaves his brushes soaking in water as an open invitation, since he knows Isaac has a habit of borrowing them at times, and picks his things up. He’s more tired than he realised he was, and he doesn’t understand how eight hours could have passed without him realising that it was even getting late at all. 

He takes a shortcut through one of the dance buildings on his way back to his apartment. He lives off-campus but not too far away, so he never bothers driving if he can avoid it. Most of his gas money goes towards paint and other materials anyway, and he needs a new computer, so it’s easier to just walk.

Only sometimes he forgets to keep an eye on the time, and is forced to do a walk across campus in the dark when he doesn’t have his glasses with him and struggles to determine which shadows are threats and which are just physical manifestations of his tiredness.

Hallucinations.

It wouldn’t be the first time. 

His footsteps echo across the linoleum floors, and it only serves as a reminder of how old this particular building is. All of the others have been renovated, the floorboards being replaced so they no longer clash with the walls, but not this building. 

He’s almost reached the exit when he hears music playing quietly. He stops, certain that someone close by is actually listening to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and he’s not just imagining it no matter how tired he is. He only hesitates for a second before turning around and going down one of the hallways he’s never been in before. 

Towards the end there’s a light on and the music is louder now, and he hesitates again because what if someone is actually practicing? 

On the other hand, they could have left and forgotten to turn off the music or the lights. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time someone left either of them on. Or, it could have been someone who, like Derek, didn’t realise what time it was and just forgot that a whole world was existing outside of their practice space.

Really, Derek is doing them a favour here. It’s four in the morning and he just wants to crawl into bed and sleep for the next three days, but, no, he’s going to help a fellow arts student out.

What he’s not expecting is someone actually practicing a routine to the Chilli Peppers. Specifically, what he was not expecting was the kid from the first day of the semester, dressed in an oversized navy shirt that has the initials ‘BHPD’ across the chest in yellow writing, and baggy three-quarter sweatpants doing a ballet routine to Dani California. Derek knows nothing about dancing or ballet, and the only thing he equated with it are that kind of shoe with long ribbons tied around the ankles. Stiles isn’t wearing those, though, instead wearing just a pair of black flats that help him glide across the wooden floors.

Derek rubs his eyes, sure he’s imagining this, but no. It’s real. The kid’s moving around the room with effortless grace, now, and Derek was clearly so wrong about his first judgements. The kid’s a born dancer, making it look easy. Making it look like the Red Hot Chilli Peppers is an obvious choice when choosing the soundtrack for a ballet dance piece. 

The only thing reminiscent of the kid back on the quad is the way the shirt keeps slipping off of his shoulders, the neck all stretched out and exposing prominent collarbones. 

The door to the studio is closed, and as much as he wants to walk inside and sit on the ground, watching until the kid decides he’s had enough of practicing, he knows that he can’t do that. It’s the same as someone asking Derek what a painting means, or flipping through one of his sketchbooks without first asking permission. It’s too intimate, far too personal, and something you can’t do when the extent of your knowledge on that person goes as far as ‘they prefer paper maps over using an application to hide the fact that they don’t know what they’re doing’.

He’d be lying if he didn’t admit that his hand was on the doorknob, though, and he had to put active thought into not twisting it.

Derek keeps watching until the kid stops dancing, which only happens when the song’s faded out and played it’s last note. The kid turns around then, heading towards the stereo that’s out of sight from where Derek’s standing, and Derek freezes. Like any dance studio, the walls of the room are plastered with mirrors and if the kid just lifted his chin even a little bit, lifting his gaze from the floor, he’d be able to see Derek. 

Instead of making himself known, instead of walking in and complimenting the kid or even saying, “Hey, you should probably know it’s four in the morning,” he turns around and flees. 

The opening notes of Dani California fade in the distance as he walks out of the building. Though, he can still hear it twenty minutes later, even when he’s out of hearing distance and walking into his apartment.

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr is [here](http://http://lostmagicofahitchhiker.tumblr.com/).
> 
> Let me know if you like it!


End file.
